Opinion Contributor

Will the real Edward Snowden please stand up?

Snowden seems to have lacked discipline after the revelations, the author writes. | AP Photo

By JOHN R. SCHINDLER | 6/24/13 4:06 PM EDT

Is Edward Snowden really what he claims to be — a whistleblower out to expose government overreach? Or is he a pawn, witting or unwitting, of America’s adversaries?

It’s been the longest couple weeks in the history of the National Security Agency, thanks to Snowden’s astonishing leaks of sensitive information — among the most damaging in U.S. history. The former IT contractor for the NSA, and previously for the CIA, has already divulged vast amounts of data about highly classified signals intelligence (SIGINT) programs. It’s by far the worst series of leaks ever for NSA, America’s biggest, best-funded, and most secretive spy agency. And Snowden promises more to come.

Text Size

-

+

reset

Obama breaks Snowden silence

But the case hasn’t taken the path many expected. When Snowden first appeared in his Hong Kong hotel, dramatically outing himself as the source of stories in the Guardian and the Washington Post about a top-secret program called PRISM, attention immediately focused on whether the NSA was violating U.S. laws and the 4th Amendment by collecting information about Americans, as Snowden asserted forcefully.

The NSA fumbled its initial responses to Congress, and it seemed the U.S. intelligence community was headed for another round of bruising congressional investigations that would uncover abuses of privacy and spur major reforms, as in the mid-1970s.

And though Snowden was not the first NSA insider to allege violations of civil liberties in the post-9/11 era, he appeared telegenic and had an intriguing backstory, complete with a stripper girlfriend; it was a story made for television and Twitter.

But Snowden seems to have lacked discipline, or perhaps has bad handlers, since the story has changed dramatically over the last week. What began as an expose of NSA violations of Americans’ rights has morphed into a full-fledged attack on U.S. intelligence from abroad, amid strong hints of involvement by foreign intelligence services.

We have heard a great deal recently about very sensitive NSA programs against China, which Snowden has compromised almost casually in leaks to the South China Morning Post. Meanwhile, the Obama administration’s effort to hold China accountable for its cyberespionage and hacking around the world has been stopped dead in its tracks.

Just as serious was Snowden’s big leak last week about several sensitive SIGINT operations by GCHQ, NSA’s British partner — revelations that have proved highly embarrassing to London. What motive Snowden could have had here, save causing pain for Britain and the United States, is difficult to decipher. With each day and new disclosure, Snowden has appeared less a whistleblower and more something sinister, perhaps even a traitor to his country.

Moreover, it looks different now that we know, according to the New York Times, that Snowden spent his last week in Hong Kong in a safe house provided by local security officials, who are known in espionage circles to be very close to their counterparts in Beijing. The flight to Moscow that followed was ripped from a spy movie screenplay, with Russian media close to the Kremlin admitting that Moscow and its intelligence services had a hand in getting Snowden to their country.